“ [365] was crazy; I come down to see you, and you say that General Ewell is crazy; and I have not the slightest doubt that my conscript, who ran from you just now, will report it all over camp that General Elzey is crazy; so it seems I have fallen into evil hands, and I reckon the best thing for me to do is to turn the conscripts loose, and march the rest of my regiment back to Richmond.” This put General Elzey in a good humor, and they had a hearty laugh over the events of Colonel Walker's visits to division and brigade headquarters.
I might as well give here several other illustrations that came under my personal observation, of how Jackson concealed his plans from even his higher officers. A short time before the battle of Slaughter's Mountain our division had been lying all day in the turnpike above Gordonsville, when General Ewell rode up to a friend of mine, with whom I was conversing at the time, and asked:
Dr.----, can you tell me where we are going?
“That question,” was the reply, “I should like to ask you, General, if it were a proper one.”
“I pledge you my word,” said the General, “that I do not know whether we will march north, south, east or west, or whether we will march at all. General Jackson simply ordered me to have my division ready to move at early dawn. I have been ready ever since, but have had no further intimation of his plans. And that is about all I ever know of his designs.”
On the march to Slaughter's Mountain I remember that I lingered at our camp, three miles above Gordonsville, until sundown, in order to ride in the cool of the evening with a brother chaplain and a sick friend (a gallant artillery officer whom we could not persuade to go to the hospital), and was thus in the rear of our whole column. At Liberty Mills we met a courier who inquired, “How far back is General A. P. Hill?” We replied: “He is not on this road at all; he moved in the direction of Orange Courthouse.” “You certainly must be mistaken,” he said in great surprise, “I have a very important dispatch for him from General Ewell, who told me that I would find him at the head of his division moving immediately in rear of his own.” Upon our assuring him that we saw Hill's division break camp and file off on the road to Orange Courthouse, he said: “Well, I must hurry back and report to the General, for he is expecting an attack, and is relying on General Hill to support him.” I learned afterward that General Jackson had made the impression on General Ewell that Hill would follow him closely by the same road, and that upon information (which proved
